CHAPTER 11

Good Communication Made Easy

You already know what communication is. You understand that it is a process by which the ideas in one’s mind are made known and understood to another. We communicate right from birth in some way or the other and continue doing so till our last breath. We communicate almost continuously during our waking hours voluntarily or inadvertently. We are social beings and to be allowed to communicate is a necessity. Although some people are less social than others, but total isolation is not desired by anyone.

You also already know that good and effective communication is that in which the idea understood by the other person is the same as the original idea that the communicator wanted to express. There should be no difference, no distortion between the transmitted and the received ideas. If there is a difference then a miscommunication has occurred. If the difference is very large or the received idea is completely different to the original message, we say that a breakdown in communication has taken place.

Communication is an all-pervasive part of our life i.e. it is involved in all aspects of our life, personal and professional. One would suppose that since we are communicating in some way or the other all the time, we should ideally be perfect at it from so much of practice. But strangely it is not so. Most people still find it very difficult to communicate in different situations with different people. Good communication is an art that has to be worked at and perfected. Before we study how to improve our communication skills, we will first have to study a little about the types of communication and the various elements of interpersonal communication.

TYPES OF COMMUNICATION

There are mainly two types of communication – verbal and non-verbal and they both happen simultaneously if the people involved are facing each other. Non-verbal communication is all about body language and it has been detailed in the chapter on body language. Here we shall concern ourselves with verbal communication only.

Verbal communication is concerned with languages and words. You know at least one language which you speak since childhood and it is called your mother tongue. You may also know some other languages in varying degrees of perfection. But we all know that English has become the global business language and is rapidly invading all areas of our lives. To be a success in the corporate world you need to be proficient in English to begin with. This involves good vocabulary, proper grammar, well placed technical terms and innovative use of words. Good command over this language will always be a positive factor in your professional growth and a skill that will take you to higher places.

If we further break down verbal communication into smaller units, we will find that this too is of two types – written language and spoken language. One may think that language is just simply language in any form, and its written and spoken forms will not be much different to each other, but in reality it is not so. When the same idea is written about, it is very different from the way it is spoken aloud. Let’s see what these differences are.

Difference between written and spoken language

• Written language is more formal than spoken language.
• Written language has to be specific to carry the precise meaning of the idea to be communicated whereas, spoken language may or may not be so specific.
• Written language is more structured, has several rules and regulations governing it and the how-to’s and the how-notto’s are binding. In spoken language the structure is not so strict and mandatory.
• Personalization possibilities are limited in written language but in spoken form, personalization is encouraged and expected.
• Due to so many rules and bindings, written form is not so free flowing whereas the absence of too many limitations allows spoken language to flow more freely.
• Understandably spoken language is more flexible than written language.
• Written language has to make sense completely through just words as the communicator and the receiver are usually not in front of each other. Therefore the choice of words and their usage has to be perfect and very well chosen whereas in spoken form, since body language helps by playing a huge role, the choice of words and their usage can be very different from those in the written form for the expression of the same idea.

Written (verbal) communication

Written business communication is a constant feature of any workday. There are many kinds of written business communications like letters, applications, forms, tenders, memos, reports etc. Here, at this stage you need to concern yourself mainly with only three and they are - the application letter, the biodata and any forms to be filled. For biodata and application letters refer to the chapter on writing a biodata in the first part of this book.

Some companies require you to fill in one or multiple forms at the time of applying for the job or at the time of joining if you have been recruited. Forms, of whatever kind, need to be filled out very carefully and with complete attention. A badly or untidily filled in form reflects badly on you. Here are some pointers for a well filled out form –

• First check the form for completeness. If more than one page, note the number of pages and make sure none are missing.
• If it is a photocopy, check its quality. Make sure it does not have any very light and barely legible areas or areas so dark that nothing can be read or written on it. Ask for another copy if possible.
• It is very important to read any instructions given carefully. For example, the color of the pen to be used to fill in may be specified or instructions might be to fill in with capital letters only. Do not ignore any such instructions.
• Before beginning to fill in, once go over all the areas to be filled in and understand exactly what is being asked for. If you don’t understand the first time, read it again instead of rushing in for clarifications for every little thing. Sometimes on reading it a few times, things become understood on their own. If still there is any doubt, go ahead and clarify it.
• Find yourself a quiet place and proceed to fill in the form precisely as per the instructions given.
• If you feel that you may not get it right the first time itself and that you have time to spare, then fill in with a pencil first so that mistakes can be easily erased and rectified.
• Write neatly and clearly in good handwriting. Be careful not too make too many mistakes since use of too much whitener looks unsightly and gives an impression of work done sloppily.
• Check to make sure you have filled in all the mandatory fields.
• After you have finished, check and recheck the completeness and the accuracy of the information filled in.
• Carefully attach any documents asked for.

spoken (verbal) communication

As already discussed above, spoken communication is easier, less structured and more fluid because body language accompanies it. Our facial expressions, hand gestures, body positioning, eye expressions and all the other ways that our body ‘talks’ helps in communicating if we have adequate control over it. (Refer to the chapter on body language) There is an exception to this though and that is when the conversation is telephonic.

Efficiency of our spoken communication depends on several elements. These are vocabulary, grammar, syntax and creative use of words etc. These have already been discussed in the chapter on pre-preparation. The concept of jargon has been dealt with in the chapter on group discussions. But, all these put together take care of only one aspect of spoken communication and that is – the content. What you are saying, what words you choose to say it with, how good is your grammar, how fluent you are and general control over the language etc. But apart from all this, there is one more aspect of spoken communication which is equally important as the content and that is your voice. The quality of your voice, how you speak, the inflections, the intonations, the accent etc. can make a lot of difference in how well you are understood by your listener and how effective your communication will be. Good voice quality will help you in capturing your audience. Moreover, this is of particular importance in telephonic conversations where the other body language elements are absent and your voice quality is the only element helping you.

You must have come across some very good orators. When they open their mouth and start speaking, it is spell binding. You are so mesmerized by them that you wish to hear them speak forever. You also tend to easily believe everything that they say because they spin a grand magical web with their words and the effectiveness with which they say them. Then you must have also met some such people who can change their way of speaking completely as per the situation - sometimes comforting, sometimes commanding, sometimes as smooth as velvet and sometimes authoritative. What is it about these people that is so different? What gives them this quality?

Also, has it ever happened with you that in a public place your attention was attracted towards a stranger just because you heard the way he spoke? The manner and quality of this stranger’s speech could have been either - very nice or very bad, but the fact that it attracted your attention means that the quality of our speech has that effect on others – it attracts attention. This attention could be positive or negative depending on the quality of our voice.

Therefore, note that the quality of your voice will definitely have a bearing on your group discussion and interview. An attractive voice and a good delivery will pull the attention of the selectors towards you in the group discussion when all the other group members too will be speaking. Also, during the interview, a voice and a manner of speaking that is not attractive can put off the selectors. Your nervousness and lack of confidence will show through as a shaky voice. Your voice will also have a very low volume that will barely be audible and you will be asked to repeat your answers or responses. Once or twice, the selectors may ask you to repeat but if you continue to speak hesitantly, they will give up on you.

Understanding good speech

Our speech is a very independent entity. It does not depend on our physical looks, our grooming, our knowledge levels, our qualifications or where we come from. A good voice is a gift by birth. A good voice has depth, a timbre to it. It is not shrill and is clear to hear. It is strong and pleasant on the ears. This does not mean that those who are not blessed with a good voice cannot improve their speech. In fact, even those who have a good voice need to learn the elements of good speech.

There are two concepts underlying good speech – voice quality and delivery. Ideally, both should be studied and developed. Although this is a study that should be done in practical, by actually speaking in front of others who are knowledgeable about it and being corrected, it is still of some use to read a little of the dynamics and to try and improve upon them.

Improving your voice –

1. Go to a quiet place, close your eyes and say something naturally. Concentrate and try to note if there are vibrations felt in your nasal area. If so, you have a tendency to speak with a nasal touch. This nasally voice is undesirable. To rectify this, you will need to do the following exercise –
   • Fix your focus on your stomach muscles because that is from where the power behind a good voice comes.
   • Lightly keep your hand on your abdomen and speak to remind yourself to use the stomach muscles while speaking. This of course cannot be done in public areas.
   • Practice speaking with the use of your stomach muscles and feel a similar vibration and tension there as you initially felt in your nasal area.
   • Do this consciously for a few days till you feel the change becoming a part of your way of speaking.
   • Alternatively, in private or in front of helpful people, speak by tightly pressing and closing your nose completely with your fingers. You will be forced to speak without the help of your nose and with time and practice you can lose the nasal touch in your voice.
2. Pay attention to your breathing. If you have a shrill and nasal voice, chances are that your breathing is shallow and quick. Learn some breathing exercises. Learn to breathe using your diaphragm and stomach muscles. Your stomach should rise outwards at the in-breath and fall in at the outbreath. Take deep breaths consciously every few minutes which will help expand your lungs to their full capacity and also give you staying power. Gradually, your breathing will be deeper, easier and more controlled all by itself. You will feel calmer, incredibly energized and more focused on the tasks at hand. This corrected way of breathing will also have an effect on the quality of your voice and how well you are able to control it, modulate it.
3. Your voice quality also deteriorates when you speak too rapidly as a habit. There are several reasons for this to happen; maybe you are accustomed to struggling to get a word in and thus you speak fast, maybe you have a tendency to long winded speech and use a lot of words where only a few would have sufficed and thus have to speak rapidly to get it all in, maybe you want to be done speaking before you get out of breath or maybe this just is how you learnt to speak and it is your natural style. Whatever the reason maybe, the fact remains that you need to change this. You need to pace yourself and maintain a speed of comfortable number of words per minute. (Read more about this under Delivery.)

Improving your delivery

Some time or the other, you must have appreciated and wondered at a dialogue that was beautifully delivered in a film. Even in real life, there probably is someone in your environs, whose way of speaking you simply love to hear, want to emulate but just don’t know what is it about his or her delivery that makes it so special. You don’t know what exactly is it that you need to pick up to be able to speak like that. Having no knowledge of the dynamics of a good verbal delivery, makes it difficult to analyze what needs changing in your own delivery.

A good delivery can make a whole lot of difference to your speech. Sometimes it can be the winning factor and get you selected, especially where the job is people oriented and involves a lot of speaking and convincing. A good delivery can make you stand out in a crowd of applicants. It can outweigh other factors like short height, not-so-good looks, a little shabby grooming etc. if it is coupled with a good knowledge base and good communication skills.

So, what are the dynamics of a good delivery?

• Pace – Indians are well known for very rapid delivery. We speak faster than most anybody else on the planet on a regular and daily basis. We can go up to 180-200 words per minute! Internationally the average is 100-140 words per minute. A crucial aspect of good communication is that the other person should understand exactly what we are saying without us having to repeat it or explain it again. Therefore, when communicating with people who you are meeting for the first time, like in a group discussion or interview, where neither are you familiar with their way of speaking nor are they familiar with yours, it is advisable to keep your pace slow and within a reasonable range. Excitement, eagerness and nervousness can make you take off with your words at a super speed which may diminish the effectiveness of the entire communication process. So, breathe, choose your words well and speak slower and with clarity.
• Pitch – Pitch refers to the vibrational frequency at which you speak. Excitement, eagerness or nervousness can also have an effect on the pitch of your voice. It may become shrill or squeaky.
• Pause – A pause that is well placed in mid speech can express more than words can and create amazing depth in the content. A well made pause of the right length of time creates dramatic effect, attracts attention and adds meaning to the spoken words. The word spoken right after the pause may not be a big word, a special word, it may be just a simple everyday word, but can convey a larger and deeper meaning if a pause is effectively used before it. An effective pause is of 1-2 seconds and in this duration, eye contact should be maintained.
• Power – A powerful voice is that which commands respect even when spoken softly. There is a depth and weight to it. It is rich and effective. Most people confuse power with volume but they are wrong. Even a shrill, squeaky or weak voice can have volume. Volume can be raised by shouting or making an effort to speak with raised volume. Power is the throw quality of a voice. It fills up the room without effort. Use the power in your voice to back a good delivery.
• Volume – Volume has to do with loudness or the lack of it. Some people speak so softly as a habit that you have to strain your ears to hear them and some speak so loud all the time that you wish you there was a button you could use to turn them down a bit. Keep a check on the adequacy of your volume for every situation. Best is to be clearly heard without straining and also without hurting the ears.
• Modulation – Have you ever come across anyone who goes on and on in one tone, a monotone? It appears as if he is droning on and you probably lost all interest in what he was saying and stopped concentrating after the initial few moments. This is because he did not modulate his voice and was monotonous. The ups and downs in the voice, its pace and tone create moods, meanings and feelings in your speech. It attracts interest and holds the attention of the listener by making your speech interesting.
• Emphasis – Emphasis on some words or phrases brings about a contrast from the other words and creates a deeper meaning. It attracts the attention to those key words or phrases and promotes better understanding.
• Tone – Tone gives emotion to what you are saying. Most times the meaning of the words that we are saying and the emotion we wish to express are the same and complement each other but sometimes they are different. This difference comes about by using a tone that does not match the words. For example, we may be telling someone we believe them but our tone clearly shows that we are only being polite by not saying “I disbelieve you” openly and that we do not actually believe them.
• Accent – Make people from different states of the country speak the same passage from a book in English and each will sound different. People from different countries too will sound different. This is because everybody has a different manner of pronunciation which is influenced by their local language or mother tongue. This is called Mother Tongue Influence (MTI). If these influences are very strong, they can make you quite incomprehensible to others even though you are speaking the common language English. If you are aware that your spoken language has a strong local accent, you have to try and clean it up with the help of Accent Neutralization. You have to pay attention to syllable stress and the way the basic consonant sounds are uttered. Listen to people who speak well, pay attention to the way they pronounce their words, observe their mouth movements and emulate them. This is a very practical oriented task. Record yourself at regular intervals to assess the progress you are making.
• Choice of words – Language skills, good vocabulary and the imaginative use of words will help you to say much with few words. If you have these skills, you will not have to make long speeches to get your idea across which can be boring and tedious to the listeners. With the use of a few well chosen and effective words, you will be able to make yourself understood smartly and keep your receivers attentive and interested in what you are saying.

A good delivery engages the listener completely. If the content of your speech is up to the mark and relevant to the occassion, your accompanying body language matches on all levels and the voice is well modulated with a comfortably understood accent, your delivery will be superb and the attention of the listener will not waver. His engagement to your speech will be complete and the end result of your communication will be exactly as desired.

The elements of communication

In the most minimal model of communication there are six elements and they are –

• The Sender – this is the person who is going to communicate.
• The Idea – or the message in the sender’s mind that he wants to communicate.
• Encoding – how the sender decides to express the idea, what channel of expression he chooses to use.
• Receiver – the person who is being communicated to.
• Decoding – how the receiver understands the idea.
• Feedback – the response that the receiver gives to the sender.

All these put together make one instance of communication. Ideally for good communication all elements are important but still think and say, which according to you is the most important one? Purposeful consideration of which element has the maximum positive impact on the success of communication? When asked this question, most people answer with either one of the following four –

• Sender -- This is the person on whom the burden of communication is, it is him who has the message, it is him who has to express it therefore he is the most important element.
• Idea – many people vote for the idea as the most important element as this is the content that has to be expressed and understood by the two parties involved. The content has to be correct and meaningful to both.
• Encoding – a lot of people vote for encoding because only correct encoding can ensure that the transmitted idea is received without distortion.
• Feedback – yet another group of people vote for feedback as the most important element because it is through feedback that the sender gets to know what the receiver understood and how accurate it is in comparison to the original message.

Well, as mentioned earlier, all elements hold their own importance in the process of communication but none of the above is the most important one. A successful instance of communication is not based on any of the above choices. If any of these had been the most important then so many instances of miscommunication would not take place. But they do. As a sender if we are sure of the idea and have encoded it as we deemed fit, then there should be no possibility of miscommunication. Yet, all around us we see some serious miscommunication taking place every day with everybody. Almost everyone has a story to tell about when he or she was grossly misunderstood or how some incident of breakdown of communication affected them or how they had to suffer a great loss because of it.

So, what is the most important element of communication? It is the receiver! The burden of communicating may be on the sender but the bigger burden is having an idea that is receiver appropriate and using a transmitting code or channel that is receiver friendly. If you analyze carefully, you will find that the entire process of communication including the original message, the encoding, and the choice of the transmitting channel is in accordance to the receiver. Let’s see how.

• The idea or message – the idea we choose to transmit conforms to the receiver. This means that we always carefully match the message to the receiver. Would you ask your 3 year old niece or your grandfather to go and watch cartoons on TV with friends? Would a general manager of a company ask the sales department for the sales report or will he ask the HRD department for it? Would the counselor of a college inform the final year students of an upcoming campus recruitment drive or would he tell it to the first year students? Will you take your math problem to a biology teacher? The answer is clear in each question. We always transmit a message in accordance to our listener, our receiver. Our message has to be meaningful and suitable to the listener.
• The encoding – Consider how you speak to a two year old child, an elder in the family and your friend. Do you speak to all of them in the same way since you as the sender are the same in each case? Even if the message is the same in each case, do you not say it differently? For example, suppose you have to express the idea that ‘you are going’, will you not say it in a distinctly differently manner to each of them? Take another example- in the office; do you not speak about the same issue in a different manner with your friendly colleagues and with the vice president of the company? Or, when you are discussing a client proposal with your colleagues, you talk in an easy manner amongst yourselves but when the very same proposal has to be presented before the clients; you pitch it with charts, graphs, audio and video aids and photographs etc. all the while using your best ‘professional’ speech. If you find yourself agreeing to all these examples, it confirms that you indeed are expressing yourself and your idea in accordance to the receiver.

We are now in agreement on the fact that the receiver is the most important element of successful communication and if we encode accordingly, choose the channel appropriately, then we can automatically and confidently expect the decoding and the feedback to be accurate. Yet, sometimes we experience an inaccurate feedback despite all the preceding considerations. Why does that happen? This happens, when the encoding and choice of channel turn out to be incorrect and not in accordance to the receiver in spite of our best efforts. Let’s see how and why this happens –

• You may have misjudged the level and the ability of the receiver. The grasping capabilities of the receiver are lower than expected. Thus, the message is not understood.
• Language issues. Maybe wrong language is being used or the level and quality of the language is incorrect and unsuitable.
• Wrong channel. Channels could be many – written, spoken, drawings, diagrams, graphs, symbols, body gestures etc. The choice of the channel to express the idea could be incorrect as per the understanding power of the receiver. For example, the receiver does not know how to read or decipher data in a graph.
• Cultural influences. Sometimes it happens that some sounds, symbols or gestures may mean something totally different in another culture than what you wish to express and is thus misunderstood by the receiver.
• There may be disturbances and distractions because of which the receiver could not receive the message in entirety. These could also create distortions.
• The receiver may not be listening effectively.

Putting the ‘knowing’ to work

The next logical question here is that how do we put this very useful bit of knowledge to use? How do we benefit from this? You do remember that the aim behind reading and learning all this is to get the job and to win the race. For readers who are already working, the aim is to be more professional, better prepared and to advance further in their fields. Since communication is a large and integral part of landing a job and growing in it, this knowledge that the best communication is that which has the receiver as the main consideration definitely has benefits. If every time you remember to keep your receivers to be more important than you during any interaction, you will always communicate to their liking and be appreciated for it.

This is particularly meaningful during the job selection procedures. Consider – why are you trying to improve your general knowledge, your language skills, your communication skills and your personality? Why are you training yourself to be able to perform better in group discussions, interviews or any other selection procedure? Why will you groom smartly and mind your manners and your body language over there? You are taking all these pains and going through all these efforts, spending time, energy and money because you want to be able to present yourself and communicate in accordance to your receivers i.e. the selectors. You know that at the time of selections, the selectors are your receivers and that they have a pre-conceived idea, an image in their mind as to how the new recruit has to be, what skills and abilities he has to have. You are trying to conform to that image in their mind. And if you succeed in presenting and communicating exactly or at least a nearly exact image, you know your chances of winning the race are very strong.

Every industry, every field of profession and every job profile has a certain set of requirements from you as a professional of that field. When you decide to run a race in a particular field, you understand what those requirements are or soon learn about them. If you have the determination to win, you have to put in the hard work with honesty and sincerity to develop those qualities. Since you realize that the competition is tough, you need to go beyond those requirements and develop such an attractive and well rounded personality that the recruiters cannot stop themselves from making an offer of employment to you.

Effective listening

Till now you have been learning how to be a good sender. But communication is a two way process. Therefore you also require to learn the technique of how to be a good receiver i.e. a good listener because only when you listen well, you accurately catch what the other is communicating and respond suitably.

Good listening is an art in itself. You don’t just hear the words and decipher their literal meaning. You catch and mix in all the subtle and not-so-subtle inflections and the intonations of the speakers’ voice to decipher the emotions behind the words which could give them a completely different meaning. You also mix in what your eyes are ‘hearing’ i.e. the visual signals sent across via body language and only after you have taken everything into consideration, you draw an inference and ‘hear’ accurately. This is called effective listening.

For example – A manager comes into the office and says “tomorrow onwards all staff members will attend an exercise session of one hour in the new company gym.” One member responds with a loud “Sure, yoohoo!” his face is lit up, his eyes are shining and he raised his arm in a whoop! gesture. One other member looks alarmed, mumbles a barely audible ‘if we must’ and is looking around in panic. Although both have responded in an affirmative, you know that the first person is thrilled with the idea whereas the second person is unhappy with the announcement by the quality of their voice and body language.

Effective listening is also a tool that can prevent miscommunication or breakdowns in communication. Further, when you are listening well, with the use of all your faculties, you will receive both the implicit and the explicit inferences of the transmitted message. This means that you will not only hear what is being said clearly in words but you will also hear what is not being said but is being implied. These hidden meanings or messages are sometimes of more value that the clearly said ones, especially in a business environment.

Good listening results in accurate responses made. If what we heard was wrong or incomplete or heard ineffectively, we might answer in ways that we may regret later. We may make commitments that are harmful to us or we may end up with undesirable results. No one wants any of this to happen. Therefore learning to practice good listening is essential.

Effective listening made easy

There is a simple logical procedure that makes listening well easy. Basically all it requires is alertness and complete mental presence. Be completely focused on the communicator and take in all the verbal and non-verbal signals being sent. There are four essential elements here –

• Input – This is the receiving part. You are ‘hearing’ to what is being said and also are attentive to all the other cues being sent out. This is akin to data gathering.
• Comprehension – Putting all the input together and synthesizing the content to make sense in the context and to understand what was communicated. Simply said, it is the ‘understanding’ phase.
• Combining – There always are other contents from the past that relate to the present content. This means that what is being said now will make more sense when some information from some previous experience is combined with it and then inferences are drawn, a complete picture is made. Here is an example to explain this – Ashok is a fresh graduate from a medium sized town and is appearing for an interview in which he feels he has done very well. The body language and the tone of the interviewers are very positive and the final question asked is “are you willing to relocate?” Ashok is in a quandary now because he feels sure he is going to get this job offer but he does not wish to relocate to a very big city based on the data in his memory of the terrifying experiences related by his elder brother of tiny rooms, long commutes, indifferent people and utter loneliness of a large and strange place combined with an unaccustomed to fast pace of life. But, he does not want to decline also. He has to put all this together and somehow make the best sense and inference out of it all to have a winning position that is also of acceptable conditions which in this case would be to have the job offer but somehow avoid going to a very large and seemingly scary city. On the spot he has to listen, comprehend the deeper inferences, match it up to previous data and come up with a suitable response.
• Responding – Once the previous three steps have been completed successfully, this is not difficult. Now you have ready in your mind the response you want to make and the only thing left is to actually make it. For responding you will have to choose the correct mode, words, tone and body language. (Ashok’s response for the above situation could be to look straight into the eyes of the interviewer and say with a strong confident voice that yes, he is willing to relocate but he humbly requests not to be sent to any metro class city initially. He should be sent to a smaller city where he can learn to adjust and then once he has, soon he will be ready to go anywhere.)

Aides to effective listening

Certain considerations help in improving our listening skills. Since we do realize that ineffective listening can have harmful results, we should strive to construct such conditions that there are no barriers to profitable listening. These favorable conditions can be –

• Be completely present. Focus on the communication taking place. At the time, do not be distracted with other thoughts going around in your mind. Any other unrelated stuff can be dealt with at another time. At this instant be completely present.
• Tune out to distractions. Sometimes it happens that the conditions are not ideal for communication and there might be environmental distractions like noise, traffic, loud music, bad smells, peripheral activity, heat, cold etc. Repeatedly your mind will tend to travel towards the distraction but you have to have enough control over it and enough focus on the proceedings that you completely tune out whatever is not right and concentrate.
• Do not be busy preparing responses immaturely. So many times it happens that we listen to only the initial part of whatever is being said and mentally start preparing what we are going to say next. We are then so busy thinking up our response that as a result we don’t listen to the latter part of the communication properly. As a result, either our prepared response does not make good sense anymore or we miss out on something very important.
• Do not harbor preconceived ideas. Sometimes we have already formed an idea, an image of what the subject of communication is all about. The speaker may be trying to say something new, offbeat or radically different, but we only ‘hear’ what we have already thought of what he is going to say. This can be very frustrating to the speaker and he will keep repeating which in turn will irritate the listener. Here the speaker is making his best efforts to be heard but the listener is actually just not listening.
• Do not assume what the speaker will say. If you have already made an assumption of what he will say, you won’t hear what he actually is saying. The notion that you have formed in your mind will prevent you from active listening. Keep a very open and clear mind whenever in a listening position.
• Try and take cultural differences into account. Certain, words, phrases, expressions and gestures can mean different things in different cultures. A common example for this is the bewilderment of westerners when they come across Indians nodding their head sideways for both ‘yes’ and ‘no’. For them ‘yes’ is very clearly an up and down movement of the head but for us it is both ways.
• Do not let personal feelings come in the way. If this is not a personal and private conversation, if it is a business communication, keep your personal feelings about the subject out of the equation. If there is much of such interference, what you hear will be contaminated and could be very different to what the speaker was trying to say.
• If your hearing was incomplete or insufficient for some reason, request the speaker to repeat instead of wildly inferring as the differences between the intended message and the inferred message can be vast. In serious business, guesswork should be diligently avoided.
• Be on a lookout for any very clever use of words or phrases, subtle change in meanings brought about by sophisticated phrasing as these can later come back as serious differences in the explicit and implicit implication and thrust of the communicated message.